WW_III_ANGRY
Thanks. I feel like I’ve been a zombie for a long time and this little piece, among others, that I had saved from way back when really reignited something in me. It’s like something to hold onto and build from. And I love the fact that I wrote it. I am obsessed with who I am. Is that, like, normal?
The silent pact seems tantamount to lying to/misleading 40% of the class.
No, this “discretion” is not self-restraint, it’s pretense. And while I realize this seems like a minor issue over chewing gum in school it makes an impression on people as they grow up. AS I said, it reinforces the idea that you should just appear the way people expect and say what people want to hear to avoid disruption. If you are disingenuous in your interactions with other people it will have a deeper affect on who you are as a person.
Now this is a fake reality. Or it is to me.
Take for instance the killing of Osama bin Laden. Was this a virtuous act because Barack Obama lives in reality as it really is? And are those who view it instead as a villaneous assassination wrong because they live in reality as it is not?
What is “reality as it really is” regarding any conflicting value judgments?
What can be known for certain here philosophically?
In my view, a sense of reality and a moral conviction are manifestations of particular daseins situated in particular sets of circumstances at particular points in time.
In many crucial respects, virtue and reality are just points of view.
Well, I would suppose a person may take into consideration how he fits in with his society as a means to determine one’s normalness in light of codes of conduct. After all, a normal person is good for the society in this world, isn’t he/she? For the smooth running of society, these codes are necessary. Even all our speculations about truth and reality are pretty much cultural values. But they are totally unrelated to the survival of your own unique physical and psychological contentment and well being. They are all socially, arbitrarily fixed values. Much of our tastes are cultivated tastes. Likes and dislikes are mainly cultivated; there is no such thing as an absolute normality when it comes to questioning who you are and questioning what you do before and after you do them. It’s all social.
Society’s purposes are society’s business and we are society so there’s’ no use in questioning that. We will only lose the sanity that society has so persistently maintained. Yet, society has little business in telling you what you are, your true essence. Whatever extraordinary uniqueness nature has created in you is yours alone. No declaration of society can give you that or take it away. Actually, you could be deemed as spoiled because of society.
You said the determining factors shall come from within and indeed they should. And they will because something will happen due to the energy that is in the life. That energy expresses itself and wants to break free from the encasements of mind mainly set in there by society. I’m not saying that to go along with society for certain rational reasons is wrong. What I am implying is if the values of society are arbitrary relative to what you are and if the society is not in a position to impose a Reality or Truth on you, then why should there be an obsession with or even a concern for who you are if you are not associating yourself with societal knowledge that didn’t come from you in the first place? If that knowledge did not come from you, then you are not there … the determining knowledge , the determining factor is within you ,not somewhere else. And definitely not somewhere outside that claims authority over you. You don’t have to buy 100% into a claim that has no proof or evidence to back it up.
When you free yourself from the burden of reaching out to grasp and experience that knowledge, then you will find that it is difficult to understand the reality of anything. You will find that you have no way of experiencing the reality of anything, but at least you will not be living in a world of illusions. You will accept that there is nothing, nothing that you can do to experience the reality of anything, except the reality that is imposed on us by the society. We have to accept the reality as it is imposed on us by the society because it is very essential for us to function in this world intelligently and sanely. If we don’t accept that reality, we are lost. We will end up in the loony bin. So we have to accept the reality as it is imposed on us by the culture, by society or whatever you want to call it, and at the same time understand that there is nothing that we can do to experience the reality of anything. Then you will not be in conflict with the society, and the demand to be something other than what you are will also come to an end.
I think it’s good practice to be obsessed with who you are, self reflection is an important process to progress.
Good questions.
Value judgments are subjective. Human beings are similar enough that we will agree about many values, but there will be differences of opinion that can’t be resolved objectively. (I hate this subjective/objective split, and I want to move beyond it eventually, but I don’t know how else to talk about for now.) But I can tell you this: if I spend the majority of my life ultimately pretending this or that to gain approval or to fulfill expectations – covering up or putting my own perspective on the back burner – instead of confronting the differences of opinion or judgement between myself and other people, then I’m suppressing and ultimately deceiving myself about who I am. I will be forced to invent fake realities and live inauthentically.
Virtue and reality are just points of view. I don’t want to discount or deceive myself about my own point of view.
That’s not exactly what I meant. I care about what other people value because I care about other people. I didn’t choose to care, I just already do.
What do you mean? How I relate to my culture’s values and other people in my society has a lot to do with my physical and psychological contentment and well being, doesn’t it? Deviance, abnormality and maladjustment are often cause for anxiety.
Can you try and explain this again? I don’t quite get it.
I must say that the terms you used to describe your experiences were quite odd; I certainly wasn’t expecting this topic when I read the title. It sounds like you are talking about lies, deceit, and putting on a facade not any type of metaphysical reality, but your essay was interesting regardless.
The first part of your essay reminded me of Glaucon’s Challenge in which Glaucon advocates that truly, to be unjust, to appear just, and to preach virtue is the best situation possible for the individual. The individual will convince others to act justly and therefor live in a society of just people but also gain the spoils of unjust actions. He makes his case that nobody desires justice for its own sake, but only for its consequences; that human beings behave justly, in other words, not because they prefer justice to injustice, but simply because they fear the consequence of behaving unjustly, and advocates egoism. Does this represent the views and intentions you had when taking these actions?
Not at all. It has to do with society and its purpose.
Only if you think the purpose of society is reality and you are looking in it for some funny thing like conformity, normality and balance to give you your own peace and calm.
Fake reality. Supposing I tell you “This is the way,” – then where are you? You experience what I tell you. This knowledge you are going to use and create a state of being and think that you have experienced reality or that you have experienced truth. But that is not the truth. What difference does it make if I tell you the way or a society tells you?
So where are you if nothing can tell you a way? Nowhere. And that is the farthest from a fake reality you will ever be. Then the truest form of reality will be right there clear as a bell, perfect awareness without any interference.
I don’t see how. It’s a pact so the students are in on it too, but it’s just not an out and out rule, more like a reward, you’ve gained the teacher’s trust, so you qualify for some leeway.
Seems like you’re trying to force your point here. How is the “self-restraint” you advocate different to the “self-restraint” I used in my example?
Well, at least we can say that the institutes are doing what they’re meant to do. The rebel in the class wantonly chews gum mocking the illusory authority they have over him. But outside of school, you’ll often find that most non-conformists are in prison. That’s what obeying the law is - conformity to rules. If you really wanted that flash car, would you go and take it? Or conform? What exactly are you advocating?
This is an odd point, well, at least, it seems at odd with the implications of your other remarks. What exactly are disingenuous actions having an affect upon if not a conscience? And what is a conscience if not the mutual pact you have with others with whom you respect the same laws, ideology, and etiquette? Maybe you advocate non-conformism to this, as do the criminals. Do you advocate this? If so, how exactly will that play out?
Good connection. Though I have never read The Republic, I would say that my striving to appear virtuous to other people supports Glaucon’s claim, but that I came to reflect on my behavior because I was deeply dispirited. I think I would have agreed with Socrates’s reply.
But I am part of society.
trevor,
No Gum has to be applied for ALL the class because of a bad 40.
This is misleading. As far as the students know, it’s simply not allowed. Then you say there’s this silent pact between the teacher and only the good 60%. (How does the teacher initiate this, communicate it to the 60%?) But anyway, given the silent pact, where 60% somehow know they can chew gum if they do it “discreetly,” the remaining 40% are still under the false impression no one is allowed to chew gum. And finally, the worst part about the whole thing is that your silent pact means basically that the 60% can chew gum if no one knows they are doing it. It encourages pretense.
The difference between self-restraint and pretense. Self-restraint is refrain, i.e. to not do something. Pretense is being one way while pretending to be another way, i.e. acting in a way that purposely deceives other people about what you really think or feel. In the case of the silent pact chewing gum example we have been discussing, I’ve already explained why I consider that pretense. Your second example about being in a bad mood is fine.
That’s what obeying the law is - conformity to rules. If you really wanted that flash car, would you go and take it? Or conform? What exactly are you advocating?
I think you’re missing my point. This is not about conformity vs nonconformity or the virtue of satisfying one’s every desire. I’m talking about being yourself, thinking for yourself … without pretense.
Some have learned to think that who they are is nothing more than their outward appearance. They value only how they appear to other people. They can’t feel worth unless they are selling themselves (acting to please, gain approval, feel worthy) in some way or another. They have no sense of intrinsic worth; worth for them is a function of how well they’ve approximated an idea in someone else’s mind.
… and society created you for its exclusive and singular purpose. You have to give to it what IT wants, not what you have to give. Virtuousness, when determined to be by a society, is a good quality FOR that society. What you think is good may be good for you and your situations, yet what is good for society may not be consistent with it.
Hmmm…I was presuming that the 60% would witness the behaviour of the 40% (i.e. non-discreet chewing) and then see the enforcement of the rule to all of them thus seeing the behaviour which triggers the enforcement and knowing who and why spoils the leeway.
The silent pact does sound a bit murky 
but I think it’s more pragmatic. I think what the students would learn is that there is a certain boundary in which they cannot cross when they’re chewing gum in class, all students could learn this boundary but there are some, the 40, who might be more likely to flagrantly cross it, it would obviously be a difficult situation for the teacher to punish those students because afterall, he/she has permitted other students to chew, but I don’t think it encourages pretense in the students. I would prefer to think that they would recognise it as a sign of trust with the teacher. Of course, this can’t be applied generally, young students wouldn’t be able to comprehend this relationship, but for the older student’s, there are better things for the teacher to concern his time and energy with. Hence why I think it is more pragmatic.
I see your point. I guess knowing the specifics of who the students are would be the only way to know whether or not it would be sensible for the teacher to allow the chewing of gum. The students would have to be at an age and maturity where they could comprehend a trust relationship, a silent pact. Otherwise yes, they would probably just act under “pretense.”
Law requires conformity, and one’s own desires may be in conflict with that non-conformity. But what is “being-yourself” if not recognising these desires? Do people just “naturally” grow up and find themselves living in accordance to the law or have they been shaped by the laws of the country into whoever they are i.e. have been conformed. Certain people in being themselves will find themselves in conflict with the law or some rules, the question is then, do they conform or not?
I understand the argument but it’s not wholly convincing in and of itself. I mean, we do not exist within a vacuum, how do people have an “intrinsic worth,” is it really enough to say “You must respect me, as I am myself”? I mean, what exactly is it in you that deserves my automatic respect? Which I assume an “inherent worth” would command. And why exactly is it a negative to not find this “worth” in the eyes of other people?
When approval seeking is a need, the possibilities for truth are all but wiped away. If you must be lauded, and you send out those kind of signals, then no one can deal with you straight. Nor can you state with confidence what it is you think and feel at any present moment of your life. Your self is sacrificed to the opinions and predilections of others.
Approval in itself is not unhealthy; in fact adulation is pleasurable. Approval-seeking is an erroneous state only when it becomes a need rather than a want.
Avoiding self-deceptions (thus, avoiding creating or expanding fake realities) is just a foundation. It is necessary, but not necessarily sufficient for virtue. There is a lot more to say about the statement “virtue and reality are just points of view.” My thinking has somewhat evolved on the subjective/objective dichotomy. At least it appears a little less straightforward to me, more nuanced. I’ll see if I can express it at some point.
yo if it’s fake how can it be reality.